The Professional CSGO scene is a very cut throat business. From an eye test, it may look like being a pro CSGO player is the dream scenario – getting paid to play the game you love. But aside from the money, a whole lot of other things go into being a pro player, with hours of practice, team building sessions, demo reviews and whatnot.
But for a second, let’s go back to the money aspect. If you ever wondered how much money top CSGO pros like Oleksandr ‘s1mple’ Kostyliev and Nikola ‘NiKo’ Kovac make, well Owen ‘smooya’ Butterfield has an answer for you.
In one of his live streams last week, smooya went on the record to talk about the salaries of certain CSGO teams. The talk started with the discussion of Copenhagen Flames and how much money Hooxi and co. make. As per smooya, the Danish quintet made around $2,000 in 2021. After an impressive run at PGL Stockholm 2021, where they placed 9th and finished just shy of the playoffs, their salaries were bumped up to $5,000.
Then, in early December, reports of Complexity Gaming acquiring Copenhagen Flames’ roster emerged and if the deal was confirmed, the players would earn around $10,000 per month. Eventually, the deal didnt come to fruition and Complexity signed the Extra Salt trio of JT, Fang and floppy alongside Grim and Junior to go back to their North American roots.
As for the best and biggest players in the scene such as s1mple, NiKo and Mathieu ‘ZywOo’ Herbaut, how much is their salary? Well, smooya had an answer for that too.
Team Vitality’s star AWPer and 2-time world #1, ZywOo makes around $40,000 per month and is part of a select few group of players that make more than $40,000. Smooya said around 10 players make over $40,000 while the next bracket consists of players making $15,000-$20,000.
s1mple and NiKo, arguably two of the best players in the world right now make more than $50,000 USD. smooya went on to say that these two deserve it, considering the brand value and the viewers they bring in, and the merch sold alongside wreaking havoc on the server for their teams, smooya is probably right.
